by Wade, Calvin
“Checkmate!”
James grinned like a baby filling his nappy.
“Looks like you’re up!” Paul said to me in a tone that indicated my drink was likely to be laced with his phlegm. He pushed his way into the hall. “Oi! Everyone! Nick’s turn to down his drink!”
Loads of people suddenly emerged out of nowhere like old people on a sunny day in Southport. They all started jostling for position, the glass was passed to Nick and someone, probably Paul, started a chorus of, “Down in one! Down in one! Down in one!” to the tune of “Here we go!”
Nick Birch had obviously mastered this art as he tilted the glass vertically upside down and before you could say,
“Paul Murphy, complete tosser!” Nick had slammed his glass back on the desk with a smile. He won’t be smiling when he’s spewing up, I thought to myself, then realised I was next and began to panic.
Paul announced me as though he was a boxing compere.
“Ladies and gentleman, make way for the next contestant, all the way from Ormskirk, Lancashire, please give a warm Halsall welcome to Jeeemmmmaaa Wat - kin - son!”
Shit! Why have I volunteered for this, I asked myself, then I remembered where the drunken bravado had arisen from. In one of Vomit Breath’s many past lives, she had been married to a geezer called Tony. Tony was a plasterer from Leighton Buzzard and he definitely was a geezer. He had moved up to Ormskirk after he was divorced from Tonya, his first wife and his mate, Charlie had suggested Tony should follow him up here for a fresh start. Charlie was a labourer and had had a brief affair with a redcoat from Pontins in Southport and had stayed up here, as there was plenty of building work going on in the nearby cities.
Tony came up, married Vomit Breath and quickly moved back South, a few years later, when he got to know the inner VB. Anyway, whilst Tony and Vomit Breath were married, his three kids, Tony Jnr, Vanessa and Marcus would come up to stay at our house for a few days in the summer holidays. The youngest, Marcus, was a couple of years older than me and he got through the pain and boredom of stopping up here by teaching me how to play chess. I was pretty good too, but that was several years ago and I had hardly played since. A heady mix of Thunderbirds and Piesporter had briefly persuaded me that I could beat James Billingham. As I sat down at the desk, reality was now telling me that I couldn’t. At first, I couldn’t even remember properly which of the knight and the bishop moved diagonally and which moved one step forward and two to the side, jumping over other pieces, then I remembered the knight looked like a horse and horses jump. It was lucky I did remember that as Paul Murphy would have had a field day if I’d have asked which piece moved where!
As I was getting mentally prepared, something from the depths of my subconscious memory banks came to me, the “four move mate”! No doubt there is a “Two Move Mate” and a “Three Move Mate”, but I didn’t remember them, at least I had managed to remember the four move mate though!
As the guest on the table, I was able to choose which colour to be, so I chose white. Not sure if there is a black four move mate, but I certainly didn’t know it. Whites always start in chess. I was nervous. I was a one-trick pony and the one-trick was dependent on the other player making completely the right (or “wrong”) moves. Luckily, James wasn’t really concentrating, so sportingly fell into my trap.
First thing I did was move the pawn in front of my king forward two places. James mirrored my move and moved the pawn in front of his king forward too. Good news so far! I then moved my bishop out (diagonally I remembered!) to attack what my one time stepbrother called the “King Bishop Pawn”. I don’t know if that was the correct terminology or whether he just made that up. I remember saying to him,
“It’s just a pawn! That’s a king! That’s a bishop! AND THAT is a pawn! If it was a kingbishop pawn, it would be a special looking pawn that looked like a king and a bishop…it doesn’t, it just looks identical to its seven little friends!”
Marcus hated this! It really pissed him off. He was, like James, a misunderstood intellectual type who had no time for a sense of humour. Anyway, James then made some random bad move, I got my Queen out, James started saying something to Caroline and Richie, I could tell he wasn’t concentrating as he made another random move without really looking, so I moved my Queen all the way forward diagonally, took the aforementioned “KingBishopPawn” and announced in an unattractive yelp, “CHECKMATE!”
Thirty seconds and it was over. Fantastic! I stood up and did a celebratory bum, arms and breast wiggle. As sore losers go, James was good.
“Hang on! Hang on! That’s not fair! I was talking!”
“Seems fair to me, James. You’ve lost! Fair and square. The King is Dead! Long live the Queen!”
Paul Murphy was temporarily stunned, he hadn’t even mixed a new drink after Nick’s defeat. He let out a,
“Bloody hell! I don’t believe it! Jim’s not only lost but lost to a girl! A girl!”
James was still moaning, “She must have cheated! Was anyone watching? Did she cheat?”
James looked round the audience. Silence. There were a few shaking heads. At the best of times, I am as cool as a freshly baked cucumber.
“Why must I have cheated? Four move mate. Oldest trick in the book. My stepbrother taught me that when I was seven!”
“You cheated! I know you cheated! Play again!”
“Not a chance!”
“Come on! Scared you’ll lose?”
“I probably will lose, but that’s not the point. The point is, you lost this time, so stop sulking like a baby and drink the forfeit!”
James muttered under his breath,
“Fucking bitch!”
Not a good move.
“I beg your pardon?”
Aware of his audience, James repeated himself, much louder second time around,
“I said, FUCKING BITCH!”
At this point, I lost it! I dived across the desk, grabbed him by the scruff of the neck, then rose up, lifting him up off the floor, whilst all the time staring right into his eyes. We were so close the tips of our noses collided but this was no Eskimo kiss. I thought I could smell urine.
“Just because you forgot your mask, Phantom of the Opera boy, does not mean you can start calling me a bitch! You need to learn some manners and start taking defeat like a man. Apologise.”
“Get lost!”
He was scared. I tightened my grip on his neck. “Apologise”.
Caroline felt the need to protect her little brother,
“Let go of him.”
“As soon as he says, “Sorry!”
James just about managed to speak through the vice like grip I had on his throat, “Not…saying…sorry.”
I smiled at him. Hannibal Lecter would have been proud of that smile.
“Jimbo, if you want to go home without a broken jaw and a party straw to drink liquidised meals through for the next six weeks, I suggest you quickly say sorry and then down that drink.”
Amongst the weak, self-preservation always beats pride.
“Sorry!”
I let go. James made pathetic choking and gulping sounds. Caroline still had more to say.
“Leave him alone now”.
“He needs to drink the forfeit.”
“Jemma! That’s not on! He’s fifteen years old!”
“So?”
“He can’t be downing massive shots of alcohol at fifteen. It’ll kill him!”
“Rubbish! I’m sixteen, if he’d have beaten me, do you think he would have saved me?”
“Probably.”
“Don’t lie, Caroline, you know he wouldn’t.”
James had his voice back.
“No, I wouldn’t! But I wouldn’t have cheated either!”
It was Caroline’s turn to lose her cool.
“James will you just shut up and change the bloody record!”
The altercation had given Paul Murphy time to mix the forfeit. Once again, the crowds had gathered. Paul spoke,
�
��Show her what you are made of James. Take the forfeit like a man!”
To the renewed chant of “Down In One!” James attempted to down the drink Paul Murphy had mixed. It was a smaller, less potent mix than the one for Nick Birch as I think Paul had taken heed of Caroline’s words and did not want to be facing a manslaughter charge before the night was out. He need not have worried as its impact was greatly diminished by the fact that the majority of the drink ran off the sides of his mouth, down his spotty chin and onto his clothes. As he put the glass down, Caroline shook her head at me and said,
“You’re tight”. I thought a lot of her, but I was very aware the feeling was not mutual! Not that I was bothered, I was not intending on changing my spots for anyone. Brimming with confidence after my chess victory, I headed back into the lounge and my romantic positivity began to return when I noticed a new group of lads in there who were about nineteen or twenty. There were four of them altogether and thankfully amongst them were a couple of lookers. Catching my eye, one of the two strutted over like a featherless peacock.
He smiled, “Alright?”
I am now, I thought, I am now!
Richie
Caroline gave me a dig in the ribs with her elbow. A chess room is like a library, you have to communicate in whispers,“Cheer up! What’s the matter with you?”
I gave her a look like she was Screaming Lord Sutch’s crazier sister.
“What’s the matter with me? Do you really have to ask ‘what’s the matter’ with me? We are at a party and there are about fifty lads to every girl, pretty much every single girl belongs in the “Gardens of Babylon” because she is so hanging and we are sat in Nick’s bloody study watching our prat of a brother beating a load of imbeciles at chess! I don’t even know how to play chess! Do you?”
“No!”
“Does Nick?”
“By the way James keeps taking all his pieces off the board, I seriously doubt it!”
“Look how many people are in here! It just shows how crap the party is when there’s a big bloody crowd crammed into the study to watch a chess match.”
As James was taking yet another one of Nick’s pieces off the board, the study door opened and Jemma Watkinson slithered in through the crowd. Jemma was, without doubt, the prettiest girl in our school year. She was tall, model slim, dark haired, blue eyed and full lipped. She ticked all the right boxes apart from the crucial personality one.
I hissed at Caroline, “Bloody marvellous!”
“What now, Richie?”
“Jemma ‘Bloody’ Watkinson. I hate her.”
“Why?”
“There’s nothing more annoying in life than a great looking girl with a crap personality.”
“What’s wrong with her?”
“Easier to tell you what’s right with her, her looks, other than that nothing!”
A penny dropped on Caroline’s brain,
“Is she the one that went out with Billy McGregor?”
“Yes!”
“You’re right. She’s horrible! She’s a strutter.”
“Pompous, obnoxious loudmouth.”
Jim was becoming agitated,
“Can you two shut the fuck up with your whispering? I’m trying to concentrate here!”
Caroline whispered again, this time directly into my ear,
“Shall we go somewhere else in the house then, after this game?”
I nodded, “Definitely!”
Caroline and I had sat for almost an hour and a half in that study, bored senseless. When we were agreeing terms and conditions of Jim’s loan to us, in the taxi on the way to the Birch’s, one of the conditions was that up to ten o’clock, Caroline and I would stick with Jim and he would decide what we would all do. After ten, the night was our own.
On arrival, Jim surveyed every room downstairs and discovered a chess board and pieces in the study. He set up the board. Nick came over.
“Are you any good, James?”
“Absolutely brilliant!”
“Great”, Nick said, “we can make this into a drinking game. We’ll get some drinks out my Dad’s drinking cabinet and whoever wins the game of chess stays on the board and the loser has to down a mix of drinks.”
Caroline wasn’t happy,
“I’ve told James he isn’t drinking!”
Jim was as cocky as ever,
“Chill out sister. I won’t be losing!”
“I’ll go and find Murphy,” Nick said, “he can referee and mix the drinks”.
Nick shot off excitedly in search of Paul Murphy, his friend who character and looks wise could be mistaken for Jim’s older brother as he was ugly, intelligent and juvenile.
Within minutes the chess games began. An hour passed and without getting out of intellectual first gear, Jim had taken on and beaten all challengers. Nick’s brother, Joey, who had apparently been smoking weed with the D-GAS boys in his bedroom all afternoon, turned up three times to mount a challenge and each game lasted a shorter amount of time as Jim brushed him aside. Six or seven others wandered in, took Jim on, lost, then wandered out with a bellyful of shots to send them on their way. A crowd had gathered, not to watch the chess, but to see the victims down the Paul Murphy mixed cocktails. For the first few games, I must admit, it was mildly amusing, but after that it became tedious. Nick had now decided to have a game himself and was faring just as badly as all those that had come before him.
“As soon as you beat Nick, that’s it, we’re out of here and you can fend for yourself!” Caroline whispered to Jim.
“It’s not ten o’clock yet!” Jim replied as he took yet another one of Nick’s pawns, leaving him with just two and his King. I didn’t know much about chess but knew enough to know Nick was stuffed.
Paul Murphy was mouthing something to Jim and pointing at Jemma Watkinson.
“What’s he saying?” I asked Jim.
“Jemma’s up next.”
“No, come on James,” Caroline pleaded, “this is so boring. Can you not just finish off ?”
“No!” insisted Jim, “you said ten o’clock! It’s only half nine!”
Jim moved another piece and announced proudly,
“Checkmate!”
Nick, as a token gesture, tried to move his King in all directions, but he knew he had lost. He wasn’t the least bit bothered, he just wanted a turn on Paul Murphy’s specially mixed cocktail, but Paul had insisted he couldn’t have one unless he played a game against Jim.
To the cheers of a mass of onlookers, Nick downed his drink in about three seconds flat, then headed out the room happily. I am sure he had better things to be doing at his own party than playing chess.
Jim was putting all the pieces back on the board in their starting positions as Jemma Watkinson was taking Nick’s seat and being announced to the crowd by Paul “Prat” Murphy.
I can’t properly describe how I felt about Jemma Watkinson at that point, as I didn’t really know how I felt. I knew one part of me hated her. As I had said to Caroline, she was a “pompous, obnoxious loudmouth” who I am sure would face a five minute delay every time she passed her own reflection, but there was an intelligence about her and a sense of sadness that was almost tangible. Add into the mix that she was physically stunning with porcelain features and pale blue eyes that were somewhat hypnotic, all I knew for sure was that she made me feel uneasy.
Once, in school, when a group of us in Biology were talking about the previous nights, “Three Of A Kind”, I had said that Lenny Henry had a look of Sidney Poitier. Jemma overheard,
“What?” she mocked, “just because they are both black you think they look alike! Do you think Maryam D’Abo and Esther Rantzen look alike? For starters, they’re both white! What about Bob Geldof and the Pope, do you think they both look alike? They’re both Catholic?”
This was one of the reasons I hated her. We didn’t speak to each other, ever, but she could butt into one of my conversations and make me sound like a racist! To be honest though, I also had reasons t
o like her. If I locked myself in the bathroom and wanted a mental image to bring my ‘teenage kicks’ to a conclusion, Jemma Watkinson often appeared in my mind wearing only a navy blue set of bra and knickers, she sometimes even consented to slip on a pair of suspenders. It was complicated!
My comments to Caroline were pretty much spot on, I thought Jemma was stunning but her personality wasn’t and I hated her creator for screwing things up. As Jim’s new game with Jemma Watkinson kicked off (or whatever the start is called in chess, moved off, pieced off, whatever), Caroline was still nagging him.
“James,” she whispered, “this is getting beyond a joke now! How much longer are we going to be stuck in this bloody study?”
“Five minutes, that’s all, five minutes, Jemma will be crap!”
Jemma may have been crap but she wasn’t deaf, they were whispering too loudly, I’m sure she must have overheard. Caroline persisted,
“Can you not let someone else take over?”
“NO!”
Jim wasn’t concentrating at all. As I say, I don’t understand chess, but Jim wasn’t watching the board, he was letting Caroline wind him up and he wasn’t paying attention to what was happening to his pieces.
“CHECKMATE!” Jemma announced triumphantly!
I slid down in my chair. This could only mean one thing. Trouble! Jemma did a rather sexy little celebratory dance and I knew she should enjoy her moment in the sun because things would soon turn nasty. Jim was a terrible loser. He thought he was unbeatable and he had just lost in twenty seconds! Jim would not take that well! Sure enough, he kicked off! All hell broke loose. Jim accused Jemma of cheating over and over again. From previous experience of her at school, I did not expect Jemma to placate matters and it didn’t take her long to flip out too! At one point she even started to strangle Jim! I sat and watched thinking that if I was a sado-masochistic masturbator, Jemma Watkinson had just given me a moment to focus on for ever and a day! She was strangling my brother! Pity kinky stuff was not my style! Nevertheless, I was enjoying the fact that Jim was getting a taste of his own medicine, the cocky little tosser needed to reap what he sowed!
